Cracked Eggs
by Kim Smuga
Summary: More fun in the asylum - dream analysis and micro-fugue states. My interpretation on what happens after the series ends.
1. Chapter 1

** Cracked Eggs - an Utena story, sort of **

** by Kim Smuga-Otto **

authors notes:

Hi, hope you enjoy the following work. Utena is one of my all time favorite series, and I'm going to do my best to write a story worthy of it. (Spoiler alert!! If you haven't seen all 39 episodes and movie, and you want the ending to be a surprise, do not read this fic (or any other "sequels") Trust me, its worth being surprised by the ending.)

Cracked Eggs takes place after the series and (most of) the movie ends and it's set in our world. This means no student council members running around with swords, no shadow girls, no Chu-Chu, no Utena. Well actually there is an Utena, and all the major charecters make appearances, just under different names. I know this is a bit non standard for fanfiction, but then I tend towards non standard stuff (see "Faster Kasumi! Cook! Clean!) Hope you enjoy.

And if you have comments or guesses for what's going on, I'd love to hear from you.

**Chapter 1**

It was the scent of roses that triggered his memory. A pink and white bouquet complete with babies breath was sitting on the receptionist's desk, obviously destined for some patient. Within the day, they'd acquire the sterile aseptic smell of everything else that came in contact with hospital's formidable cleaning staff, just another casualty in the never ending battle against the forces of bodily fluids and germs.

"I dreamt of roses." Miguel said, almost to himself.

"Really?" asked Caroline, the chief pharmacist who, like him, had just arrived at work, "And here I was ready to believe the rumors that you never sleep."

"I sleep." Miguel said, his voice soft-spoken but serious. "Just not much. And my dream . . . I had forgotten it until this moment. There was a garden beyond a gate, and I was waiting for someone to come out of it. My watch had stopped and I kept looking at it, trying to figure out what time it was. The smell," he indicated the bouquet, "it brought the dream back."

"Vat do you think it means, Doctor?" Caroline asked, her accent comic Viennese.

"I think it means I'm anxious for spring."

"Aren't we all? Bad news is, it's still January. Winter lasts a lot longer here in Michigan than it does in Southern California."

"I found that out last year."

Caroline rolled her eyes. "Last year hardly counts; you arrived in March. Oh," she said suddenly, "Miguel, did you hear? Sleeping Beauty woke up."

"Sleeping Beauty?"

"You know, in ward four. The LaCiel girl. She woke up last night."

"LaCiel." realization dawned, "She's Jordan's patient, isn't she? Did he change her medication?"

"No, she's not on any drugs. What I heard from the on-duty attendant is that she just sat up and asked where she was. Nearly gave him a heart attack. Got to love working in a mental hospital - always something happening."

"She's been classified as a vegetable for what, five years?" Miguel shook his head in wonder.

"Must be more like ten. She predates me. They used to keep her in the children's wing then. She was so tiny, couldn't have been over ten back then. Just lying there all the time . Made me appreciate my own hyperactive kids, let me tell you."

Miguel thought back to his most recent visit to ward four several months ago. LaCiel had been arranged in a wheelchair by the window giving the impression that she was looking out on the autumn colors. Everything about her, from her almost atrophied legs to the drool that ran down her slack jaw spoke to the failure of his profession. A poster child for those who no miracle drug or treatment would reach.

And that was all the thought he had given her. She was not his patient. Not his responsibility. Professional detachment kept him sane, and it kept his energies focused on the ones that stood a chance. To devote himself to ones like LaCiel, the living shells, could only end in failure, draining him in the process. It was a mistake he couldn't afford to make again.

Except now that shell was awake. As a scientist, he wondered how this happened. As a human, he wondered, why? A child in a woman's body, what would she make of this world, what would the world make of her? And her past, what demons might it contain? To the psychiatrist who attended her she would pose a plethora frustration and rewards.

"I know that look." said Caroline, the wicked smile dancing once more upon her lips.

"What?" replied Miguel, his eyes admitting nothing.

"You want her, and you're planning how to get her. How to convince Jordan, and, if that doesn't work, the board, that you're this girl's best hope for recovery and a normal life. And you'll do it too." She shook her head.

"I-"

"Don't apologize. You'd be the egomaniac doctor in every administrator's worst nightmares, except that you really are gifted. Go talk to Jordan, his caseload's too full to give her the time she needs. I'm sure he's looking for a way to offload her. Sooner better that later, in case anyone else is looking to get her. And, Miguel," she said as she turned to leave, "do good by her. From what I remember of her story, it isn't pretty."

Dr. Jordan Bank's office was on the second floor of the only original wing of the state hospital. It overlooked the now frozen creek, had real plaster moldings around the windows, fine oak floors, ten foot-high ceilings and, hanging above the polished cherry desk, an almost antique fan that hummed gently as it circulated the air. There was much speculations over who the office would go to when the good doctor retired, most bets being placed on various administrators.

That Jordan was able to secure this office in the first place was due to the anti-psychotic drugs which revolutionized psychiatry in the late sixties. In a fit of administrative optimism, most of the grand old state mental hospital was demolished. All but the most catatonic patients were given over to the care of halfway houses scattered around Michigan proper and its upper peninsula. The remaining wing, devoted almost entirely to administration, was quiet, sedate, and unimportant enough to give a doctor such as Jordan a very choice office.

As the hospital's wards filled, as additional wings of the low ceiling, small window, and wood paneling were hastily built, as more ambitious and modern doctors entered the system, Jordan managed to hang onto his office only because of his good nature. He was a sweet man, conscientious to a fault, always willing to concede to newer and better-trained doctors.

Everyone in the hospital was fond of the old fellow, even Miguel.

Which still didn't make the geezer any less irritating, thought Miguel, as he listened to the man rattle on about the case.

"Actually, I only took it over about five, six years back. I was present, of course, when she was first admitted. Quite a big fuss, police and press everywhere. I even met a few FBI agents. It's all there in the file."

He gave the two large boxes next to him a friendly pat, raising a small dust cloud.

"Naturally," he continued, his voice rising and falling in a singsong manner, "the case was first given to Dr. Aston, who, much like you are now, was the young genius upstart. Bit of a fuss was made about it at the time, and still more when it came out how hopeless the whole thing was, but I think he gave it his all. I don't think any of us could have done better, and there were a few who might have done worse. You know, odd ideas about certain procedures . . ."

His voice trailed off and a slightly distressed look came over his face. Professional manner, Miguel noted grimly, it covers our faux-pas so conveniently. He felt no need to relieve Jordan's discomfort by rushing in with stories of his personal experiences with "certain procedures." After a moment, Jordan composed himself anew and continued with his reminiscence.

"That was about ten years ago. Still, I'm sure you must have heard something about it. I remember my sister calling me up about it. She was living in California at the time and said it was on all the news shows."

"I wasn't paying much attention to television back then." Miguel said. He let his statement hang in the air, savoring the paled look of Jordan's face.

"I'm sorry, was that when - ?"

"-I was in medical school," Miguel finished for him. "First year. World war could have broken out and I wouldn't have noticed. But you were saying . . ."

"Oh, yes. Well, the press had a heyday. It's all here, every major story." Back on more comfortable territory, Jordan regained his former rhythm. "Dr. Aston was very precise with his record keeping. I read it all when he turned the case over. His wife was offered a position at the NIH headquarters and he transferred away to Virginia.

"I called him about the case first thing this morning. But he agreed it would be better if someone else took it; it's been so long, and now most of his work is with rhesus monkeys, purely basic research. I was going to approach either you, or Dr. Ito, to see if you'd be interested. I was very impressed with your work on the Matheson case . . ."

"I am interested," Miguel said quickly, hoping to keep him from wandering onto another subject. "I find the whole situation fascinating and quite challenging. There are so many aspects to Tamara LaCiel's case, so many things to be considered."

Dr. Jordan nodded, as if in agreement. "Tamara LaCiel. You know, we don't even know if that's her real name."

It was past noon when Dr. Jordan finally finished his reminiscences of the case, just past seven when Miguel wrapped up his own daily commitments, and well past three in the morning as he finished reading the LaCiel file.

He'd barely noticed the time. The instant soup he'd made for himself was untouched and stone cold in the office's small microwave. The cleaning staff must have emptied his wastepaper basket, but he didn't recall seeing them.

His mind was swimming with the details of the case: the news reports, FBI files, interview transcripts, and medical records. It surprised him that he hadn't heard anything about it at the time, but that was before he had met Theresa. Back when he hadn't yet woken up to a world outside of classes and learning. Seventeen year-olds could be so oblivious.

And the case had faded fast in the public's mind, once it turned out there was no happy ending to the fairy tale the press had made out of it. He really didn't blame them. Tamara was a modern version of sleeping beauty, if you were to substitute a snow-covered car wreck for a castle encircled with thorns, a weekend-long blizzard for a hundred years of isolation, and the fading warmth of her dead parents' bodies for a fairy's prophecy , it seemed only right that the prince of modern medicine should be able to awaken her. Besides, she'd been discovered two days before Christmas Eve, a season ripe for miracles.

He wondered what her life would have been if she had awoken back then. A minor celebrity, adoption into a kind and loving family, college funded by selling her story to a made-for-TV movie. And now? Would anyone care? Probably not. And that was for the best.

She'd appreciate the quiet. He knew he had. The thought stopped his musings temporarily. For an instant the old fear was back, overwhelming his thoughts. Miguel felt his chest tighten, his hear race, felt sweat on his brows as he gasped for air. He should give up the case, give up his position, get far away, now! And then the panic was gone, only uneasiness remained.

"I think I need some sleep," he said aloud. Three hours should be enough.

He kept some hospital-issue bed sheets in his desk drawer, along with a sleeping shirt and a change of clothes. It came in handy when he worked late. The patients' couch doubled nicely as a bed and there were plenty of showers. If rent in Ann Arbor weren't so cheap, he'd almost consider camping out in his office permanently.

It was just tiredness, nothing else. The case would work out fine. He'd had such anxiety attacks before, and they'd always passed. This thought didn't really relieve him but he must have been tired, because he fell asleep as soon as he lay down.

He dreamed he was riding in a car in a snowstorm. Neither the man driving nor his female companion would turn around or speak to him so he could only stare at their light and dark hair, respectively. In the seat next to him sat Manuel, who kept demanding a Happy Meal so he could collect the complete set of magical swords. When Miguel awoke at half past six, he remembered none of this. A press reporter charged with finding "Sleeping Beauty" would walk right by Tamara, Miguel mused. That was because people expected coma victims to be untouched and eternal, despite the long years of immobility and getting only the minimum exercise time from the overworked staff. They viewed comas as everlasting sleep, and sleeping people, with their muscles relaxed, the the stresses and pettiness of their expressions absent, could be so beautiful. Most never considered how daily exercising of muscles, even the act of talking, shaped and toned the individual, and how, in the absence of such daily movements, the patient's form contracted and tightened.

That being said, Tamara LaCiel looked to be in remarkably good condition. Her dark skin was splotchy, her black hair dull, her fragile limbs unnaturally curved, her weight badly distributed and her jaw stuck out at an odd angle, but Miguel had seen much worse.

It was her eyes that gave him hope. They had a sharpness to them that seemed out of place with her situation. She looked at him with a measured curiosity that seemed to belong more to a person of her biological age than the child she actually was.

"There's more to her than you'd think." The chief nurse told him. "She hasn't asked too many questions, or said much for that matter. You get the feeling she's waiting for something."

The girl had just been fed breakfast and was propped up on pillows. Miguel sat down on a chair opposite her and gave what he hoped was a reassuring smile.

She smiled back. You couldn't call it beautiful, the unpracticed muscles of her face didn't have enough control, but it looked looked genuine and familiar. He found himself wondering if he'd ever given his caretakers such a smile, and felt his heart race.

Contrary to the opinions of those who knew his history, he had not changed his profession to psychiatrist out of some new found sympathy for the mentally afflicted. Emergency trauma provided more than enough of those. And while he felt a certain amount of empathy for his patients, he never felt the urge to compare their experiences to his own.

But now, looking into Tamara's eyes, he couldn't keep from making comparisons. But there weren't any really. They had been expecting him to regain consciousness. His mother had been practically camped in his room. Several of his former classmates were working at the hospital. And Theresa, Theresa had barely left his side that first day he awoke. As a doctor he understood all the terms that were used, took for granted all the explanations for events he could no longer remember. Why then, did this girl's plight resonate so strongly?

The memory surged up without warning, commanding his full attention, immersing him in the experience.

He was still confined to bed, but they had left the window open and he had been absently staring into the courtyard. There was a gently breeze playing though lush trees, their canopy almost completely obscuring the walking path beneath. Still, he could catch glimpses of young people, students most likely, walking this way and that. He was watching for one student in particular.

The door opened and a woman he recognized walked in. Miguel felt shame welling up inside, mixed with regret. He had deceived her, used her. And there were others, so many others twisted to his will.

"I'm sorry," he had cried out, the horror of it becoming more and more clear, "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I-"

"No," she had rushed to his side, "No, Miguel, it's all going to all right now."

Miguel. It was his name. And standing before him, holding his arms tightly in case he might hurt himself was Theresa. Her face, lit by the cold November sunlight, was real and concrete, driving away whatever dream state he'd been in.

He was Miguel Sanchez and she was Theresa Sanchez-Phillips, and his window, four stories up, looked out onto the main parking lot. This was reality.

But for a moment, before Theresa had spoken his name, he had been somewhere else, had been someone else. Now this other person was gone, vanished from his mind, disappeared into oblivion because Theresa had not acknowledged him.

He grasped Theresa tightly, pulling her close. Grateful with all his being that she had chosen him, not the other, and frightened beyond measure that someone could wield such power over him.

He'd often wonder how much of that terrifying delusion was due to messed up brain chemistry or lingering hallucinations from his sickness. After they adjusted his medication, it all seemed quite silly. His personality, developed over the twenty-three years of his existence, couldn't be erased as easily as that. No matter what creations his addled mind might have invented, it couldn't override who he really was.

Tamara was still smiling at him, or perhaps smiling at an imaginary person in an imaginary world made real over these last ten years. And if he spoke her name now, crumbling that other reality, would she return to being a frightened orphan child?

What if instead of Tamara he spoke her other name, her true name?

"My name's Dr. Miguel Sanchez." He said, sidestepping the imaginary conundrum he'd created, "You can just call me Miguel."

"Miguel." She repeated. Her voice was weak, even raspy.

"I'm going to be one of the people helping you. Like the nurses, and attendants but different. We're going to meet every day, and you can ask me questions, and I'll probably ask you questions in return. But you don't have to answer anything you don't want to."

Tamara nodded. Miguel knew the nurses had already explained this to her. She was really a child, he reminded himself. He had never trained as a pediatrist, and all his psychiatric patients had been adults. His experiences with children were more personal; he'd have to brush up on the literature tonight.

"Why?" she asked, a picture of Manuel when he hit his inquisitive stage

"It's my job, to help people with their problems. To talk and work things out."

"I don't have any problems." Tamara held his gaze. Curiosity had turned to defiance, but that was typical with new clients.

"Well, then maybe I can ask you some questions."

"Okay." She said, her guard firmly up.

"Remember, you don't have to answer if you don't want."

It seemed to relax her, slightly, "Okay."

"What's your name?"

She paused for a moment and then said, a bit doubtfully:

"Tamara."

The nurses had been told to avoid calling her by name, but there might have been slips, especially when she first woke up.

"Do people always call you Tamara, or do they have other names for you?" He asked, trying not to lead.

"I think," she said slowly, "people used to call me something else, before."

The muscles of her face tensed as she spoke the last word, giving Miguel a glimpse of the woman she could become given proper exercise and therapy. High cheek bones, large eyes, heart shaped face, the girl would be quite the looker.

"Do you remember anything from before?" It wasn't the question he had been planning on asking.

"Do you mean last night? Or . . ." Her voice trailed off and she got a distant look in her eyes. "I remember dying. And there was white, everywhere."


	2. Chapter 2

**Cracked Eggs **

Chapter 2

The girl everyone called Tamara did not sleep. Around her were the sounds of slumber - snores, shuffling, murmurs, and occasional cries. Anne, the patient at the end of the row of beds was known to sing Catholic hymns, but not for the past four nights, they had changed her medications.

The beds here weren't right - too thin, too springy, and wrapped in a protective rubber covering that stuck to the sheets and kept Tamara from ever getting comfortable. A real mattress, she had complained to a nurse whose name she'd already forgotten, was soft and fluffy, and when you let your body fall on it, it would make a whooshing sound.

"Do you remember having a bed like that, when you were young?" the nurse asked, and Tamara could detect the hope in her voice.

"Maybe." she lied.

It wasn't some distant childhood memory, but a well known repeated sensation. She knew that the bed should swell up around her body, cool to the touch but firmly protecting her from sneaky coldness the same way she knew water should be wet or ice should be cold. But the knowledge ended there, with no connection to anything beyond the last week.

A week filled with physical therapy, evaluations, skill learning sessions. They promised that these activities would help her remember or at least make sense of the world, but if anything, they just muddled her sense of reality more. Was orange juice supposed to leave a bitter aftertaste? Was sunlight as insubstantial as the stuff that illuminated the gray outside world? Did flowers truly have no smell? 

Wasn't night supposed to be dark?

It wasn't here. Not with the constant dull red of the exit signs or the faint yellow glow from night lights mounted at regular intervals around the room or the sharp slice of white light that seeped under the door from the hallway. Every hour, one of the oderlies would enter, their shoe's rubber souls squeaking gently on the linoleum as they passed each patient.

Kevin was on duty tonight. He'd made his rounds through the room a few minutes ago, and on seeing that she was awake, asked her if she needed to use the toilet. No, she had told him, ignoring the tightness in her stomach. When he asked again, speaking slowly and enunciating each word, she'd pretended to be sleepy and he left.

Everyone here was like that. All the nurses acted like mother hens and Burt, her physical therapist, kept calling her kiddo. 

Dr. Sanchez was the worst. No one called him Miguel. All the nurses paid attention to him when he spoke, and rushed off eagerly when he requested anything. She'd seen him with another patient when they wheeled her around for a tour yesterday.

He'd been in the hallway with a large bald man wearing pajamas whose hands were in constant motion. They cut through the air like blades, whirling above and around the doctor; once they clipped his ear. He never moved, or even flinched.

"Don't you be worrying about Dr. Sanchez." Her nurse had said, "He's one of the only ones who can handle Roger."

Tamara had been worrying about Roger. The part of her that knew about mattresses and flower smells also knew about snakes. The way they'd lie, still as stone with their eyes pretending to wait forever, and the way they'd strike, lightning fast, deadly precise. Dr. Sanchez was undoubtedly a snake. After he asked a question, he'd remain motionless, waiting for her reply, his eyes pretending he didn't already know the answer.

Like today, on his third visit, she had finally asked her own questions.

"Why am I here?"

He had been writing on his notebook, noting the information written on the clipboard hanging by her bedside. Now he stopped mid-scribble, and carefully placed both pen and notebook on the sideboard, each lined up parallel to its edge.

"You've been asleep for a very long time." He said simply, his eyes never leaving hers, "This is a place where they could look over after you." 

"Now that I'm awake, can I leave?"

"Of course," she hated his confident smile, "when you're ready." 

"But not yet." Tamara added the unspoken words.

"You're not ready yet," he said.

She felt her face grow warm with embarrassment. She couldn't walk, couldn't cook or take care of herself, couldn't remember who she was, of course she couldn't leave yet. A real snake attack would be less painful.

He went on to tell her how her parents' car had run off the road in the middle of a blizzard, how they had frozen to death, how her body had been found between theirs, barely alive. Dr. Sanchez explained that her father, Thane LaCiel, was a drifter, with no real home. His older sister, her only known relative, had not seen him in years. And there was no way to identify the woman with him, or Tamara for that matter.

They'd found a paper star badge with the words Tamara L. written in an unsteadied hand. The doctors placed her age at six or seven, making her sixteen or seventeen now.

That was her story he was carefully spelling out, the facts of her life that he knew so well that he didn't even need to consult his clipboard. And it meant nothing to her. Dr. Sanchez held out a faded photograph of a little dark haired girl and Tamara tried to imagine looking into a mirror, seeing that face staring back. Tried to remember being small, tried to remember anything before she woke up last week.

"When are your parents coming to visit?" Wanda, the white haired woman in the bed next to her had asked this morning. "Mine are coming tomorrow to get me. Don't tell anyone, but I'm really a princess." And she'd smiled her toothless smile.

So her parents were dead, and there would be no visits. It made sense, a part of her had known that she was alone, and that she'd been alone for a very long time.

"Here," said Dr. Sanchez, passing her two more images. "That one is a high school photograph of your father, and the other is a pencil sketch of your mother. She looks Hindu, from India that is."

Thane's face was defiant, with a smirk twisted into his smile. He was light, with blond hair and freckled face, and only his blue eyes seemed to match her own. The woman didn't look like a real person. Her eyes stared straight out and her mouth neither smiled or frowned. She did, Tamara noted, look like she could be pretty with her long black hair and heart shaped face.

"What happened to me, when I was . . . asleep? " She asked, returning the pictures.

"You grew up, at least physically. They fed you with a tube, kept you hydrated, exercised your limbs every day, bathed you and made sure your catheter didn't leak, When you were about ten, you caught pneumonia and almost died. But you survived; you have a very strong body."

"Why did I wake up now?" Tamara wanted to know.

"No one knows."

He did that on purpose, she was sure. Luring her into awe by his knowledge, his big words, his profound statements, only to shrug his shoulders when he seemed ready to reveal everything.

Dr Sanchez didn't know anything about her, Tamara decided as she lay in her bed. The body he thought was so strong could barely stand without assistance. Everyone told her she must not push herself too hard, that it would take months to walk by herself.

If I stay here, I'm going to wet the bed. A sixteen year old did not wet the bed. She decided then that she would make it to the toilet, and she'd do it without anyone's help.

With new resolve, she swung herself into a sitting position and pushed onto her feet. Pain, a familiar sensation when she made any large movement, shot from her soles through her legs. Ignore it, she commanded her nerves, and, strangely, the pain receded to an annoyance in the back of her mind. 

Standing, turning, taking a single step - she'd practiced these thing just this morning fighting for even basic balance. But now she remembered, or her body remembered. She had done this before, and not as an uncoordinated six year old.

There was a full moon out and its light fell onto the now empty bed besides her, illuminating the bars bone white against the red sheet. The pattern wasn't right. It should be rounder, more ornate. She watched it intently as the angles and bends rearranged themselves into the proper alignment.

Satisfied, she advanced to the door and the bright light beyond it. Barely had she touched it when the doors swung open, now she just needed to find the stairs.

They were longer then she remembered, and she had to stop twice to rest against the wall. It didn't matter, someone was waiting at the top. Another landing, another turn, another step and never mind the heavy breathing, the sharp stab as she shifted her weight.

It was a promise that kept Tamara going. That and the person who she'd made it to. They'd meet at the top of the stairs, like always.

For the first time she felt happy, alive, certain of her purpose. An individual stepped in front of her. She nearly cried with delight.

"Tamara? How did you . . ."

The sunlight went dark, the stairs straightened, and it was Dr. Sanchez before her. Tamara's legs began to shake and she grasped for the banister, missed, and twisted. Below her were the linoleum stairs, ugly and utilitarian, and she was going to fall down all of them.

A strong hand caught her around the stomach while a second clasped her shoulder. With no apparent effort Dr. Sanchez steadied her and, sensing that she could no longer support herself, gently eased her weight onto his. The threat of falling now safety avoided, another urgency made itself known.

"I need to use the toilet." she whispered the shameful secret, refusing to cry.

"All right," the doctor replied. In fluid motions, he easily rotated his body to her side, slipped one arm over his shoulder and positioned his second hand under her armpit. He let her lean on him and they started down the hallway.

"There's a washroom next to my office."

For once she appreciated his professional detachment. He maneuvered her into the stall, got her seated, even handed her the toilet paper without looking at any part of her body but her face.

"Would you like to rest in my office?" He offered her afterwards, and she nodded gratefully.

It wasn't a large room, but it easily fitted the desk and couch. There was a bookcase along on wall, and a small window with the curtain drawn. On top of the filing cabinet were the dried remains of a plant. The walls were white, and his desk was clear of everything but a stack of files. 

She noted as Dr. Sanchez situated her on the couch, called the nurse station so they wouldn't worry, fetched a blanket and then a glass of water. There was nothing of him, no artwork, no photographs, no care at all to make the place his own.

Except for his undeniable presence. He took the water glass from her hands and sat in a chair pulled close to couch, saying nothing. His eyes were in resting snake mode, but no less alert.

"Thank you." She said, and added, "am I going to get in trouble?"

"I shouldn't think so. Walking that far is very impressive, I think everyone will be quite proud of you." He smiled, and for once it didn't feel patronizing. "Tell me, why did you come all the way up here? Did you get lost?"

"I . . .I don't know. I think I thought I was somewhere . . not here but . . . somewhere else." It sounded silly to her ears, she wondered if the doctor would laugh.

He didn't. But his smile tightened. Even more than at the top of the stair, Dr. Sanchez materialized. His true nature forming before her.

He pretended to ask question casually, but, as in their other sessions, she could hear the clicking of his mind. Tamara imagined him taking her answers, her choice of words, even the pauses and uncertainties and fitting them all together, assembling a mirror of herself within him. And then? When he had her sorted, classified, categorized, what would he do with her then?

"Someplace familiar?"

"I don't know," she lied, remembering the sureness of her feet as they made their way up the stairs, the person waiting.

"Have you had similar experiences in the last week?"

"I don't think so," Once, she suddenly recalled, when a nurse had come to take her dinner tray, the woman's face, her smile had seemed belonged to someone else and Tamara had unexplainably started to cry.

"Is there anything at all your remember thinking when you were walking up the stairs? Or before, was there something that might have triggered the sensation?"

"No." She had been remembering the images of her parents, how their expressions seemed familiar. The man's arrogant smirk, the woman's vacant stare - where had she seen them before?

Dr. Sanchez sighed ever so slightly. He turned away from her in a very unsnakelike fashion.

"What are you doing here so late? Do you live here?" She looked around at the unadorned office.

"No, I have an apartment." Dr. Sanchez said, "I was working late; I'm afraid I lost track of time."

"So sometimes you just don't go home?" It seemed incredulous to Tamara that anyone would choose to stay in the asylum.

"Once in awhile."

"Doesn't that worry your family?"

"My family all live in California."

"What about friends?"

"I . . ." Did his jaw clench, he certainly looked tense, uncomfortable.

Their roles had been reversed, she noted with pleasure. Tamara pressed on.

"You told me I could ask you questions."

"Yes, I did." Dr Sanchez gave quick laugh and his old manner returned. "I shall have to add the condition that you may ask question related at least somewhat to yourself or your situation."

"You don't like answering questions about yourself?" Tamara asked, fighting to keep her advantage. 

"My goal is to help you understand yourself, Tamara, to guide you to reaching your potential as an independent adult. Detailing my life to you doesn't further that goal. Do you understand?"

"Let me ask one more question," she begged. No one, not Burt or any of the nurses knew much about Dr. Sanchez. All they'd tell her was that he was a excellent psychiatrist and that she was very lucky to have him for a doctor. There was more, Tamara could tell from the way they pursed their lips and looked away, but they wouldn't tell her.

"And you have to answer it truthfully," she added.

"I have to? And if I do, what do I get in return?"

"I'll . . I'll tell you my dreams." Tamara promised.

"And if I refuse, then you won't? I'm not sure if this is a good precedent." He seemed to give the matter some thought, "Very well, one question."

One question. What should it be? For some reason she wanted to ask him if he wore glasses. There seemed to be something missing from his face. 

Tamara peered carefully, there was something she could only describe as a shift, colors muted, lines muddled. Dr. Sanchez was in front of her and nothing was missing from his face. Why had she been so certain he needed glasses?

"Do you have any children?" Her question was just as odd as the one about the glasses. Tamara wasn't sure where it came from, but the effect on Dr. Sanchez was immediate.

His was a hunted expression and Tamara felt gleefully like the mongoose from the cartoon movie shown last night. Either out of honesty, or refusal to flee, Dr. Sanchez would answer her question, Tamara was certain. She waited patiently.

"I had a son," Dr. Sanchez said after a minute. "His name was Manuel. He died several years ago. He would have been seven this May."

"Are you sad about it?"

"I said one question," but Dr. Sanchez didn't mean it because he continued, "I should be. I remember being ecstatically happy when he was born, and I know I loved him very much. That time of my life . . . it was rather bad, quite horrible really."

Dr. Sanchez was young, Tamara realized, probably younger then most of her nurses and certainly younger the other doctors. During the day, in his white coat and scribbling on his clipboard he seemed ageless.

"It's the patient that's supposed to confide their life story to their doctor, you know?" Dr. Sanchez said, seeming uncertain. 

"I don't have a life story," she replied, not wanting him to stop, "only what you told me. I don't remember any of it personally."

"I don't remember Manuel's death personally, either." And he began to laugh, a hoarse, breathy laugh. "I have a near eidetic memory," he explained, "It means I remember almost everything that's ever happened to me. I can repeat lessons I learned in first grade, all two months of it. I ended up skipping most of the early grades. I graduated from college when I was fifteen and medical school at nineteen, specializing in urgent care. I worked in the emergency room at a hospital in Los Angeles. And I can tell you the specifics of every case I saw there, except . . . one."

He had a distant look on his face and Tamara was sure he was searching for that lost memory. Dr. Sanchez gave a curt shake of his head and came out of the reverie.

"I shouldn't be telling this. But you're just asking all the correct questions, Tamara. What are you going to say next?"

The smile he gave her was watery, weak. She had bested him. It surprised her to feel shame. Part of her wanted to take back her questions, but she couldn't stop herself from pressing on:

"If you can't remember, how do you know it happened?"

"Brilliant. Just brilliant. You know, Tamara, you've got us all of us at the hospital at a loss. Your vocabulary is that of a well read teenager. Bert is continually amazed by your motor dexterity. And your IQ tests indicate you're either a six year old ultra genius or an above average seventeen year old.

"As for your astute question, I trust the people who told me what happened. My wife was also a doctor. When we were both working a neighbor would watch after Manuel. The woman had a swimming pool and one day she got distracted or something. Manuel fell in, she didn't know CPR. They actually took him to my hospital. Of course I didn't treat him, but supposedly I assisted in some of the prep work. Manuel was without oxygen for nearly fifteen minutes, there must have been extensive brain damage. He had slipped into a coma by the time he arrived, and he died less than month later.

"It was the first time in my life that things hadn't gone the way I wanted them to. Apparently I didn't take it well. My marriage fell apart, my wife and I separated. I know I kept working because I remember treating patients for several months afterward. Then, nothing. You remember Rachel Lynn, the woman who walked into your ward yesterday?"

Tamara remembered the red head. She had been wearing only her underwear and screaming about aliens and FBI agents. It had taken two orderlies to control her.

"Let me talk to Mulder. I demand to talk to Fox Mulder." Tamara had heard her cry from the hallway for several more minutes.

"I was like Rachel Lynn," Said Dr. Sanchez. That was his secret. He didn't look embarrassed or afraid, just sad.

"I had a breakdown," he went on, "a complete schism from reality. At my worst, I was catatonic, unable to interact with anyone. Luckily, I had an exceptional team of doctors and made, what they termed, a miraculous and complete recovery. I'm one of the few people out there to have both published and been written up as a case study in the Lancet, that's a very famous medical magazine. I'm very grateful, but a side effect of the treatment is that I'm missing almost all personal memories from that time."

"Like me." Tamara heard herself whisper.

"Not necessarily. You've only just started to recover, Tamara. It takes time. There's every indication that you will make a full recovery, both physically and mentally and there's every chance that you will regain your memories. Of course, considering that you were at most seven at the time they might not make sense. The doctors at this hospital are going to do their best to help you at every stage of your recovery."

As he spoke his assured demeanor returned somewhat, and she felt relieved. His snake eyes didn't seem so menacing now.

"And you'll be there too, right?" Tamara asked. It seemed impossible to her now that she had despised him.

"I . . .I'm afraid not, Tamara. I suspect that I don't have the objectivity required to handle your case. I'm very sorry, but also glad to have recognized the situation so early. I'm going to talk to Dr. Ito tomorrow. He's an excellent psychiatrist, you'll see."

"But-"

"Tamara," said Dr. Sanchez, his voice once more distant, professional, "it's nearly dawn and I need to get you back to bed. I promised Kevin to return you almost an hour ago."

"But I promised to tell you my dreams," she protested.

"All right," Dr. Sanchez relented, "One dream. But not now, it's too late. I'll come and see you tomorrow when you wake up." 

Tamara wanted to argue for more, but found she didn't have the energy. She barely remembered Dr. Sanchez helping her down the stairs and was so sleepy that even her mattress, when Kevin lay her down, felt acceptable. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Cracked Eggs **

Chapter 3 

"I was in this ornate greenhouse," Tamara began, her voice distant and almost chant like. "It reminded me of a birdcage and inside it was really humid and warm. I was hungry and I had to grow my own dinner from a banana plant. In order to get it to produce fruit, I needed just the right amount of water. But my watering can was all screwed up. I couldn't control the flow, either it was dripping, or the water was gushing out so strongly that it would force the plants right out of their pots and they'd float away and I'd have to move onto the next plant. It was so frustrating. Then I remembered I had these eggs in my pocket, but they wouldn't break. I even threw them against the walls but they just bounced off. And then I told myself, 'They're not eggs, they're ping-pong balls.'"

She couldn't hide a wry smile at this last detail, her serious manner giving way to the gentle amusement that so endeared her to the asylum staff. 

"Do dreams always sound this silly when you repeat them, Miguel? When I woke up it seemed meaningful, profound even. I'm sure I'm forgetting something."

Miguel said nothing while Tamara pursed her lips in concentration. He wondered if she appreciated how natural it looked. There were still a few residual deposits of fatty tissue under her chin and cheekbones, but those would soon be excised away, leaving Tamara indistinguishable from any eighteen year old. 

No, Miguel amended his prognosis, Tamara's features and the life she brought to them would forever set her apart from the average woman. Even now she was undeniably pretty.

And intelligent, and graceful, and resourceful. It was the opinion of all the staff, regardless of their personal involvement with her case, that Tamara would soon be a healthy and independent member of society. 

A miracle, the press had once more christened her, although thanks to circumstances involving her recorded age and being a ward of the state, the news items were little more than regurgitation of the asylum's official statement. No interviews, no photographs, no hints to the true extent of Tamara's recovery - even the tabloid reporters had mostly left.

Tamara, for her part, was appropriately cheerful and optimistic; only Miguel was privy to her desperation to explain the ease of her recovery. She was convinced that her physical and mental accomplishments were not so much learned as remembered. There was a certain logic to her theory, although, as Miguel pointed out, even he hadn't mastered advanced algebra by age five.

"No," Tamara said at last, "that's all I can remember, except that I'm almost certain I had long hair, at least down to my waist."

She tugged at one of her locks and scowled at it.

"It will grow," Miguel assured her. Personally he thought short black hair with its slight undercurl becoming, but Tamara was intent on growing it to "at least as long as it was when I came here." Miguel pegged it as a symbolic, but harmless, longing.

"So, what does it mean, Miguel?" Tamara said, returning to her dream, "And don't go asking me what I think it means. I hate it when you do that."

"Do you suppose that I have a special Jung-approved dream decoder, with translations for banana plants and ping-pong balls? It only works that way in the Barbara Streisand movies they're so fond of showing here."

"Then why do you listen to my dreams in the first place?" she demanded.

"Because you're intent on telling me them." He said. Tamara feigned indignation at his teasing; she had an uncanny ability to grasp the meaning behind his words.

Their sessions, whether formal office ones like this, or the informal ones they seemed to have at least once a day, always began with Tamara's dreams. To Miguel, they seemed the normal hodgepodge of images and sensations of any subconscious mind. But to Tamara, even the most absurd detail might be a memory from her childhood, proof that, like every human, she had a past.

I'll tell you my dreams, she had bargained with him that witching hour nearly a month ago. Each recounting was a renewal of her pledge to sincerity, and perhaps a hook to lure him back the next day.

Miguel had honestly intended to end their professional relationship, dreams or no dreams. But Dr. Ito, the only psychiatrist at the insitution he respected enough to handle the intricacies of Tamara's situation, had been called away for a family emergency entailing a daughter, grandchildren, and a week's stay in Boston.

Too many details of Tamara's life needed looking after for Miguel to withdraw from her case, so he stayed on, arranging for tests, physical and occupational therapy appointments, convincing administration that Tamara needed to be moved to a double occupancy room and given privilege to roam the halls. 

As to actual psychiatry sessions, his intention to keep them cursory was thwarted from all sides. Tamara, up till then closemouthed and guarded, became a spring of information and personal anxieties. A cognitive scientist from Ann Arbor contacted both him and the administration about Miguel collaborating on a case study concerning Tamara's information acquisition. The asylum's director, delighted by possible publications, let him off several of his commitments, "as to allow him to more fully focus his attentions to Tamara's situation." Even Lynette Grumanski, Miguel's personal psychiatrist that he met with on a bimonthly basis, approved.

"Complete objectivity is one of the bullshit concepts we drill into students to try to keep them from developing crushes on their better looking patients, Miguel." She had said after he confessed to his lapse of professional detachment, "it's all right for your patients to know you aren't God, it might even be a good thing. And it's high time you started opening up to people."

Miguel said nothing of transferring the case when Ito returned, and determined to steel himself against the dangers of becoming too emotionally bound to Tamara. His resolve seemed to be holding. There had been no more emotional outpourings, no more midnight confessions. As for the enjoyment he got from each session, it would be all right as long as he did not disregard his professional obligations.

And he was devoting enormous energies to the case. Tamara was acquiring vocabulary, information, and opinions at an exceptional rate. To distinguish between her current environmental influences and any pre-coma experiences required extensive monitoring by both him and the nurses. Every day he spent several hours classifying and cross-referencing his and the nurses note on Tamara's words and nuances, looking for clues to Tamara's past. Miguel was skeptical of unearthing any irrefutable facts relating to her parents or upbringing, but even probable memories might sate Tamara's longing for a personal history.

Miguel made a mental note to have Tamara describe greenhouses and banana plants later in the session.

"Dreams," Miguel continued, "so current pop-psychology theory goes, are the mind's way of telling us things we already know, and by that logic, revealing to the trained psychiatrist, or fortune teller, what the patient, or mark, thinks they know. And thus I am very glad to hear about your dreams, it gives me a chance to appear insightful and impressive."

That got her to smile. Miguel admitted a sincere fondness for Tamara's smiles. They reminded him of the sort Teresa used to radiate back in the days when they were idealistically in love.

"But to appear truly brilliant, I need choose my interpretation carefully," Miguel said. "If I say, Bert has you hitting ping-pong balls to increase your muscle control, they serve bananas here in a watery syrup and their fried eggs are as hard as rocks, you're unlikely to set up another appointment. If, however, I say that in your dream you were frustrated in your inability to manipulate the watering can, or to crack the eggs, and possibly this symbolizes your frustration from the numerous new tasks you're working to master, like holding a pen, or standing without a walker, then I've got you hooked for at least six more months of therapy."

"And if I demand to know what the greenhouse represents?" Tamara gave him a wicked smile. 

"I'd have to make something up, because longing for spring is a given when it's still two days until March, and the temperature is barely hovering above zero, never mind the wind-chill. Last night I had a dream where I was trying to grow hydroponic black roses."

He said it offhandedly, hoping to get her to laugh.

She didn't.

Instead her body stiffened and all the life animating her features, the very force of her personality, drained away, and with it the illusion that Tamara was fully recovered. Miguel knew that her chin still jutted forward unnaturally, knew the she couldn't straighten out her fingers completely, knew that her spine still curved and that she had no muscle tone on her arms, but her determination to move and react like a heathy person overcame this. Except at times like this.

Miguel had dubbed them micro-fugue states because of the way Tamara's personality took flight. Her body retained balance and muscle control, and the only measurable change was the absolute dilation of her pupils.

What her brain was doing during the state, they could only guess. Two weeks ago they hooked Tamara up to the hospital's electroencephalograph for the night. Miguel had sat by the monitor until morning, willing Tamara to stand up and walk unassisted like the time she'd managed to climb the stairs. 

He was convinced it had been a micro-fugue and not just normal sleepwalking. Partly it was Tamara's claim to have been dreaming at the time - with the exception of muscle twitching, during dream sleep, the human body is essentially paralyzed. But mostly it was that her eyes had been actively darting about just before she regained conciousness, a trait common to her micro-fugue states.

Tamara had slept peacefully and uneventfully through the night. Her brain waves were normal, save that she spent nearly half the night in REM sleep, twice human average. She had been disappointed with the EEC scans, and even lobbied, unsuccessfully, to have the the machine moved to her room so she could be monitored every night.

She had the belief, probably encouraged by the nurses, that through the micro-fugue states, she might be tapping into surpressed memories. Whether she was or not was a moot point because Tamara rarely remembered anything from these altered states, and when she did, it was more nonsensical than her dreams.

Or perhaps the micro-fugue states were the key to recovering her past, and Miguel was just prejudiced against them because of his own dreams. He'd been having nightmares, as many as five a week, and the only salvageable image was that of Tamara, caught in her micro-fugue state, bereft of life, her very soul, forever.

Lynette had identified it as a fear of failure, and working with Tamara was the first step in overcoming this deep-seated anxiety. It was the logical explanation, a dream diagnosis solid and relevant enough to warrant bimonthly sessions for a year.

Except he knew it had happened before. He'd awaken on the verge of screaming, with Tamara's listless face etched upon his brain. And as he'd lay paralyzed in bed, there would be the certainty of other empty faces from suppressed nightmares. Nightmares that had started before he took Tamara's case, before he'd even come to Michigan. It was a nebulous memory, the sort normal people trusted implicitly.

"I know it happened," a patient would claim. "I remember the warmth of the sun, and the feel of the sand between my toes."

They never considered how the brain could reconstruct or even invent memories, from other's stories, or television, or even the random firing of neurons.

His memory registered every encounter perfectly - from his first grade bus driver to the Jehovah's Witness who'd stopped him on the street last week. Every feature, every nuance, every word they spoke, was instantly and forever available for recall. The soulless humans of Miguel's nightmares were mere fragments of hair, of height, of identical unseeing eyes, the inventions of his subconscious mind.

They weren't real people, therefore he shouldn't feel guilty. But he did, to the point of nausea, even now when he was fully awake and in possession of his senses. because it wasn't his failure that robbed the dream humans of their souls, but his careful and deliberate actions. 

In all his life, Miguel had never desired power over others. Knowledge, acceptance, love, but never power. The ruthlessness with which he twisted and manipulated the demi-citizen of his subconsciousness disturbed him, and reinforced his disdain for pop psychology.

He forced himself to watch Tamara's face, to will her to return from this micro-fugue, excessively grateful for his heartfelt relief when her eyes twitch and tremble. She was waking up.

"I, I remember now." she said, her breathing heavy, "In my dream, I'm trying to crack the eggs for someone else, for Anjali, because . . ."

Anjali. It was the first time Tamara had spoken that name. ". . . because," Tamara continued, "she was . . . hungry?" Her brow wrinkled; the struggle to remember was pulling her back to full consciousness. 

"No, that's why I was growing the bananas."

She said nothing for a moment, and Miguel was forced to prompt her:

"You were growing the bananas for Anjali?"

"No, I was growing the bananas for the monkey." There was a certainty to Tamara's voice that Miguel had never heard when she discussed her dreams. And that was enough to bring her fully back. "Why would I be dreaming about a monkey, Miguel?"

"There was the Aladdin movie last week," he hazarded.

"Yeah," Tamara chuckled, her mood and manner returning to their eariler state. "And afterwards I had the dream where I was pretending to be a prince to impress the princess and everyone kept telling me to be myself. I couldn't get the songs out of my brain either. Wait, I just said something important, didn't I?"

"You said a name, Anjali."

This was the point in the Barbara Streisand movies where at least one actor would break into emotional tears. Tamara's eyes barely widened.

"An jal li," she said awkwardly. "Is a woman's name?"

"You referred to her as she. You said in your dream you were cracking eggs for Anjali."

"Do you think I used to know someone called Anjali?"

"Possibly, or you saw something on television or in a movie?" He made the comment seem mundane. The last thing he wanted was for Tamara's imagination to create an Anjali to fill in her memory gap, "I'll look into the name. Do you remember anything else?"

"I was in one of those micro-fugue states, wasn't I? I can always tell when I'm coming out, but never when I'm entering one. When I'm in them, it's like there are no gaps in my memories at all. I'm exactly who and where I'm supposed to be. But afterwards, it's like my mind made it all up, and I can't even remember what I imagined I thought I knew.

"Nowadays, it only seems to happen around you, Miguel. Maybe it's your personality."

"Or maybe I trigger it with words, my dream about black roses."

It didn't work this time, Tamara simply laughed. She seemed content to leave Anjali and any implications of the micro-fugue to Miguel for analysis. Her complete trust in him seemed that of a very young girl.

"How about I translate a dream for you?" She said, "The black roses symbolized that spider plant up there," she pointed to the top of his bookcase, "and your feelings of guilt for letting it die. You should throw it away and get a new one."

"What?" He'd stopped noticing the brown mess months ago. "Oh, they gave me that when I arrived. I guess I forgot to water it."

"I thought you had an eidetic memory."

"You have found my fatal weakness - plant maintenance. I also never remember to change the oil in my car."

"Why not just mark it on your appointment schedule, or better yet, I come to see you here twice a week, I'll remind you then."

"I better not get a cactus then."

"No, get something lush, and green, with flowers. Our dreams were right, we've had too much winter. I long for sunlit gardens. Hey, Miguel, I bet it's really nice in Florida this time of year."

She smiled wide and Miguel started to laugh, in a genuine way that would shock the staff and anyone that hadn't known him before his breakdown. Yet another reason Lynnette was determined for him to stay on the case.

"How about we start with a plant?" he suggested. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Cracked Eggs  
Chapter 4**

On Wednesday, they'd thrown her a surprise unbirthday party, and Tamara had caused a minor sensation by going into a micro-fugue in front of everyone.

Burt had nonchalantly suggested a detour through the cafeteria during her exercise walk through the hospital. There, Tamara had been showered with confetti and balloons. Most of the staff, including the hospital administrator, and the healthiest of the patients were in attendance.

There was a pinata, followed by cake and punch and people standing up and making speeches.

"It has been my extreme pleasure to work with Tamara," Miguel had begun. He had a nervous smile, but his voice was strong and steady. "I think I can speak for everyone when I say that she had never ceased to impress us, not only with her incredible accomplishments in the last three month, but by the determination and enthusiasm that she has approached each new task, each new goal. I'm sure she'll scold me for this later, but I don't think we can thank her enough for the inspiration and general feelings of good will that her presence has brought to the asylum. And my plants are grateful for her constant reminders to water them. 

I'd like to propose a toast to Tamara." he said, raising his dixie cup.

"You are so lucky to have him for your shrink," whispered her roommate Ellie.

"He is brilliant," she whispered back.

"I wasn't talking about about his brain." said Ellie, and gave Tamara a wink. "My shrink's as hairless as a billiard ball, and yours has a ponytail. God, I wish I was you."

Her own orphan, amnesiac, and weakened state not withstanding, Tamara had to agree with Ellie.

Ellie had recently plucked off all her eyebrows in an effort to get them symmetrical. She'd been diagnosis manic compulsive with bulimic tendencies, but not officially suicidal - the drano drinking incident that got her institutionalized had been classified as a "cry for help" and not an "actual suicide attempt." And the public stuff was nothing compared to some of the late night confessions Ellie regaled Tamara with.

"I wonder what he would do, if during one of your sessions you were to confess having a romantic dream about him-"

"I don't dream about him in that way."

To which Ellie merely smiled. And Tamara held her tongue. Claiming that Miguel's insightfulness was his finest grace would only get her subjected to teasing.

And then came the presents, box after box, so many that Tamara began to worry how she'd fit them all into her room.

"Well," said Abbey as she gave Tamara a rectangular parcel, "Think of it as make up for all the Christmases and birthdays you missed. And most of it's practical, stuff you'll need when you leave here."

There was a wistful quality to her voice. Tamara had been hearing that in several of the staff, especially when they talked about her eventual transfer to a halfway house.

It would be odd when that day came. There was no doubt in Tamara's mind that she wanted to leave the asylum, to return to the real world. But, as she honestly admitted to Miguel, she hadn't the faintest clue what the real world would be like.

The hospital, despite the fact that it was filled with insane people, had focus. If you had enough mental wits to realize where you were, you tried to get better in order to leave. To that end, Tamara had been performing exercise, working through tests, and achieving whatever goals that the staff put in front of her, anything to get her out of here. And then? 

"Then you get to muddle through life, like everyone else." Miguel had replied when she asked him in their session. "No one's life ends with 'happily ever after.' Even the prince and princess have to wake up each new morning and live another day."

To live another day, Tamara supposed she could have worse goals.

Abby's gift was a pair of shiny white tennis shoes, with laces.

"Plenty of manual dexterity practice." said Abby.

Tamara was getting that from unwrapping all the gifts. There were so many, ranging from the completely practical like clothes and shoes, to the impractical, stuffed animals and chocolate. Miguel gave her a miniature tape recorder.

"To record your dreams when you wake up." he explained.

"Mine next." Said Roger. His recent change in meds seemed to be doing the trick.

He pushed forth what looked like a crystal ball on a stand.

"My sister got it for me when she went to Disney world." He said, holding it upside down in front of Tamara and shaking it. "It's really pretty, see."

The globe was filled with liquid and sparkling flakes, and in the center, a castle. It's supposed to be snow, she realized as Roger returned the globe and everything in it to an upright position. 

Tamara watched the upside-down castle, white with blue trim.

"It's almost a perfect match." she heard herself say.

Miguel was right, life didn't play out like a Hollywood script. The first fugue state she'd had in almost a month, and all she'd done was articulate on the resemblance of snow to falling, white rose petals. Of all the trivial and nonsensical things to blurt out.

Yesterday could have ended perfectly, if only she had regained a single memory at her unbirthday party. As it was, she felt sheepishly guilty for making such an overt public demonstration - way to show her gratitude to her caretakers and friends, she wanted to give them proof for her return to health, not evidence for further hospitalization.

Tamara gave the shoelace a final tug and focused herself for the task of standing. She was keenly aware of Burt's watchful, and critical, eyes. 

After weeks of aching muscles, back pains, and shear exhaustion she had successfully navigated her way from one end of the hospital to the other, managing a flight of stairs, without sitting down once. Her reward was to be allowed half an hour outside, by herself, but she sensed her fugue episode had cast doubt in her physical therapist's mind.

Everyone had their own take on exactly what the fugue had been about. Abby thought Tamara must have visited Disney world as a child. Ellie was convinced the fake snow had triggered memories of the blizzard and car crash. Roger just thought that she didn't like his gift and had retreated to the back of the room to sulk. Miguel, giving an enigmatic shrug, refused to comment.

"He has dreamy eyes, exactly like Keaneau Reeves." Ellie declared that night. Tamara disagreed, Miguel's eyes were obviously superior, they could convey intelligence as well as kindness.

Ready, stand. Tamara commanded, and her body obeyed. It was exhilarating, and a tad nerve-racking, not to use her hands to support and steady herself as she shifted weight to her feet.

"You sure about this?" asked Burt.

"You've asked me that already." Tamara turned to face the door.

"All right, then." said Burt, stepping between Tamara and her goal, "But I don't want you leaving the sidewalk, and stay in the area directly in back of the asylum just in case."

"I promise." She was tempted to peer around him, the outside world was beckoning.

"And no climbing trees," Burt continued, "or going swimming, or hitchhiking into town." 

"Don't they have warning signs to prevent that?" Tamara teased.

"Such a smart aleck," Burt shook his head. "Here," he pulled a thick heavy coat from a bench nearby. It was thick and formless, in a horrid shade of olive.

"But it's April," she protested as she wriggled her arms into the sleeves, they were too long. At least it had been recently laundered, and not with the horrid smelling stuff they used in the asylum.

"April in Michigan. You'll thank Miguel soon enough." To Tamara's puzzled expression, Burt clarified, "it's his coat. He didn't want you getting cold. Even put your tape recorder in the pocket."

Tamara's fingertips found the familiar plastic lump and smiled. Perhaps the coat wasn't so detestable.

With happier thoughts, she gave the doors a push and took a step outside. The cold air whipped at her ears, stung her eyes and found its way into her nostrils causing an involuntary sneeze.

"It has a hood, too." Burt lifted it over her head relieving Tamara of her peripheral vision.

Thus fully garbed, Tamara LaCiel took her first steps outside. Actually, she'd been out on two occasions previously, once seated in a wheel chair, the other time heavily assisted by a walker. Neither time had felt like an accomplishment.

There was no one around as she traversed the sidewalk that curved through raised wooden boxes. Garden plots, Tamara suspected, although now they were only containers for dirt and with patches of snow. It was all rather dreary and damp, and the overcast sky didn't help. The only non-grey came from the line of pine trees, planted equal distance apart, further down from the asylum.

She got to the end of the paved path quickly enough - it was a small garden - and stared back at the asylum trying to pick out Miguel's office. I wonder if he's seeing a patient, she wondered.

He still refused to give her his interpretation of what her fugue states were, or meant. 

"I'm more interested in how you perceive them." he had said when pressed.

"What I think . . ." Tamara paused. A theory had been forming in her mind, an explanation for her fugue states, her dreams, even her amnesia, but she'd never spoken it aloud, even to Miguel. 

"When I was in the coma, everyone thought I was brain damaged, right?" she asked.

"That was the general hypothesis, yes," he said. "It doesn't seem to be holding up to current evidence."

"But could I have had brain damage and then, over the ten years, my body might have healed it?"

This provoked a thoughtful look in Miguel's eyes. She wondered if he follow where her questions were leading.

"Do you want me to answer the question as a scientist or as a therapist, Tamara."

"A scientist." she said with certainty, which evaporated as she saw the resign look on Miguel's face.

"Brains don't heal, not the way a cut or broken bone would, there's no new neurons to replace the dead ones. They can reorganize themselves, to compensate for damaged areas. But there's no evidence that this occurred in your case, Tamara. According to the CAT scans, your brain is normal and fully active."

"But," she countered, "I was reading that there are trillions of neurons in babies brains, and the way they connect determines memories and personalities. And during this time, the unused neurons die off."

"As with anything, it's far more complicated and contested than that. But go on."

"I was thinking that maybe I was brain damaged when I went into the coma, but I had all these extra neurons that hadn't yet been destroyed. So what if my brain - what was the word you used - reorganized itself, with all new connections, to make a whole new person? Do you think that's possible?"

"Do I think?" he echoed. "As a scientist, no. Neuron connections are made in response to stimulus. Your personality, Tamara, is far too exceptional to have spontaneously emerged."

"But there could have been stimulus, from the conversations around me, from bits of remaining memories. What if my brain was constructing an internal world from all that, and the me standing here now is the result of that dream world I grew up in? And I know you're going to point out that I didn't seem to have any brain activity during that time. But there could have been sporadic activity when no one was checking for it, like how you were telling me that we only actually dream about a quarter of the time that we sleep. Scientifically, something like I proposed could be possible, couldn't it?"

"Not that psychology is the best example of this, but science isn't about building elaborate theories around the exceptional, unexplained case. Your situation is inexplicable by any accepted theories or evidence, and thereby proves that our knowledge is woefully incomplete. But I'm afraid that wild hypothesizing is not the solution to this deficit."

He gave a tiny shrug, as if to apologize for his inability to rewrite the laws of science to allow for Tamara's situation. 

"Would that have been your answer as a therapist?"

"No, as a therapist I would have completely derailed your train of thought by trying to get you to address why you wanted to disassociate yourself from your childhood."

She wasn't trying to disassociate herself, she thought as she looked for somewhere else to go, she still had almost twenty minutes. The fugue states were the key, she was certain.

She never knew when she was entering a one, but there was a point, just before she was fully awakened, when Tamara swore, everything just seemed to fit. As soon as she'd made the realization, the information would rush from her grasp, leaving her with nothing but a feeling of loss.

The pine trees were calling, and there was something of a clay path leading up to them. Just a walk down to trees, then I'll come back.

As she took a step, she pulled the tape recorder out of her pocket and pressed record.

"Next fugue state," she spoke, "I'm going to remember just one fact, just one."

There was a flash of yellow to her right. She turned her head to look beyond the hood, but saw nothing. Taking a step, Tamara heard a rustle. Whatever it was, it was in the tree line.

She took a hurried step, and then another, almost a run. It didn't occur to her how natural the steps were, how her balance held, how her feet compensated for the slickness of the trail.

There were two lines of trees, forming a hallway of green around the trail. And there, at the end, was the yellow thing. The cold had made her eyes water and she couldn't quite focus, still she ran on.

She shouldn't run like this, she was liable to twist an ankle, like before. And then he'd be angry, and yell, and complain about carrying her around. But it would be all right, because she would be extra nice to make up for it. And even if they fought, Tamara wouldn't be alone, there'd be Nanny, and -

I'm not standing, the realization came sharply to Tamara. I'm falling, but how . . .

"I will remember." she made an effort to speak the words aloud, "I will remember one thing."

A summer day, a sound, something soft and sharp, two eyes staring back at her.

Tamara twisted slightly, and felt her shoulder impact the ground. Her neck snapped back, her vision went dark. And that was the last thing she remembered.

"Tamara, Tamara."

There was an ever so gentle tap on her cheeks, and Tamara opened her eyes to see Miguel's worried face above her.

"Tamara," she could hear his heavy breathing, "You didn't come back in time. We went looking for you."

She still wore the hood, but her head was elevated, propped up on Miguel's knees. The coat was getting somewhat damp from the melting snow. Miguel had only his white doctor's coat over his shirt and pants.

"Bert's checking the East grounds, and we have an attendant looking out front." Miguel continued, his eyes nervously scanning her, probably measuring pupil dilation.

"Miguel . . ." her voice sounded weak to her ears

"Does anything hurt?" Gently he raised her to a sitting position, his arm supporting her weight "We'll need to check you over, just in case."

"Miguel, listen. I remembered. I finally have a memory." She got his attention.

"You . . . You do?"

"Yes, I was coming out of fugue state, and, it's real, it's just right there, not at all like any of the dreams, more like remembering breakfast or one of our sessions."

"What do you remember?" There was genuine excitement in his voice now.

"A cat. We had a pet cat. A kitten, really, I remember holding a string for it, and it kept jumping up and making these cute sounds. It got really into it and clawed my fingers, and I cried. Her name was . . . Nanny. I'm sure, really."

"You said we," Miguel reminder her, "We, we who?"

"We, we . . . No, I only remember the cat, just that time. She was a tabby, almost yellow. Just like -"

"Eaoow." came a squeak.

Tamara and Miguel turned to see a yellow puffed creature perched in the tree, two eyes staring out at them, as if in expectation.

"Just like that cat." said Tamara, and felt a pang of doubt. She must have seen the cat and it influenced her. She might have made up the whole memory just now.

Leaving Tamara to support herself, Miguel stood and approached the tree. His body, Tamara noted, seemed to sway slightly. The cat didn't move as Miguel stretched out his hands and made soft clicking noises. It allowed itself to be picked up. Slowly Miguel turned towards Tamara.

She was intent on looking at the cat. It did look identical to Nanny. She looked to Miguel to see if he was doubting her.

Miguel's eyes were like snake eyes. Cold, calculating, and detached. The muscles surrounding them had relaxed, making his eyes seem like perfect windows into his soul. And there was no humanity behind them. 

"Miguel," she whispered, a horrible chill taking over her body, "Miguel."

He was looking right at her, but not at her, not at Tamara.

Unconsciously, she began to scream. 


End file.
